Recent Posts

North American Financial Holdings (NAFH), a bank
holding company run by former Bank of
America(BAC)executives, is eyeing an initial
public offering, and has hired Bank of America, Goldman
Sachs(GS) and Credit
Suisse(CS) to advise on the deal.

NAFH, set up two years ago to invest in troubled banks, would be
just the third IPO of a bank since 2009, according to data
provider Dealogic. The other two were BankUnited
Financial(BKUNA), a private-equity-led
turnaround of the failed Florida bank, and First
Interstate(FIBK), a Montana-based family-owned
institution set up in 1968.

NAFH was part of a flurry of so-called "blind pools," designed to
overcome regulatory resistance to "fast money" from hedge funds
and private equity firms seeking to enter the banking sector.
Eleven of these were raised in the wake of the crisis, and they
typically promise investors the ability to exit through an IPO,
as NAFH did, says one person who saw the offering memorandum when
the fund was raised last year.

Bond Street Holdings, another blind pool similar
to NAFH, announced its intention to go public via an S-1 filing
with the Securities and Exchange Commission in
May.

SJB Escrow Corp, set up by real estate magnate
and Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, hasn't bought a bank and
may end up returning money to investors, including hedge funds
Greenlight Capital, Maverick
Capital and Elliot Management,
TheStreet
reported Tuesday.

NAFH, by contrast, has acquired six banks and invested 85% of the
capital it raised. NAFH CFO Christopher Marshall declined to
comment, as did a Credit Suisse spokesman. Spokespeople for Bank
of America and Goldman Sachs did not respond to questions.

Douglas Woodcock, head of equity capital markets at D.A. Davidson
& Co., which was one of the underwriters of the First
Interstate deal, believes the market is selectively open for bank
IPOs. Woodcock says he is aware of "at least a couple" other bank
IPOs in the pipeline, which he declined to name, though he said
he was not aware of NAFH, and the ones he is aware of are not
private equity owned.

"For a select group of banks there's actually an opportunity to
go public, but I don't see a tidal wave of IPOs by any means," he
says.

Anton Schutz, portfolio manager at Mendon Capital, says the
BankUnited deal "opens the door," for potential bank IPOs, and
says he is familiar with Bond Street, run by former North Fork
CFO Dan Healy.